and after, there is tech support

[cellio]

My mother is not computer-savvy, and when she's ready I'll help her sort out my father's computer stuff and (I hope) break into his account so we can sort out whatever household stuff he was managing online (like bill payments). She has "an old password" written down; here's hoping that helps.

She mentioned, in passing, that she'll contact their cell carrier to drop his line -- no sense continuing to pay for a second phone, after all.

Do I need to prevent her from doing that until we determine whether he was using 2FA for anything? I haven't figured out the right search queries that will cut through what you should do in advance lest you lose your phone. Like, I don't know where or if he was using 2FA, so I can't just go in and set alternate recovery addresses or something. The point is to be able to get into those accounts later, when my mom is ready. Does she need to keep paying for cell service so that phone number will be able to receive texts, or is there some other way to handle that? Should I go with her when she visits the cell provider (yes she was going to go to a store and do that in person)?

Anybody among my readers navigated this before?

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

I'm with madfilkentist on this.

You absolutely want to keep the phone number until everything is sorted. Consider this non-negotiable, and find a way to make it work.

You probably want to keep a small data allowance tied to that phone number.

You definitely don't need a high-end tier service!

Not knowing what kind of cell service your dad had, it's hard to give specific recommendations beyond that.

Most likely the provider's cheapest tier will do eminently. Maybe you can even convert that cell service to a prepaid SIM card?

Just as long as you keep the phone number active!

SMS 2FA is a reasonable thing to expect to run into. Yes, you probably can work around it, but it's much easier if you can keep the number. TOTP 2FA (the six-digit 30-seconds codes and "use our Authenticator App to scan this QR code to set up 2FA") doesn't rely on the phone number, just the shared secrets, but that's less likely for someone not computer-savvy.

/The Internet Dog

[cellio]

Thank you. My dad was tech-savvy, so he might have used an authenticator app, and if so that should be fairly easy to discover when I get access to the phone. But even with auth apps, sometimes you need 2FA. I know I deal with some services that only support SMS and not the apps. So you're right; the number needs to stay in service. I will ask my mother to not try to do anything with it yet -- don't try to change the plan (which could go awry and she might not notice), if the cost is a problem I'll pay for it, just don't touch it.